From ABC, this is the 10 percent happier podcast.

I'm Dan Harris. Hello, my guests today does a fantastic job of speaking in a not at all annoying way about the inarguably important yet potentially very cheesy concept of self-love.

Heyman's sunim is a Korean mega monk who has developed a massive online following and has written huge bestsellers, including one called The Things You Can Only See When You Slow Down.

He's also earned degrees from Berkeley, Harvard and Princeton and is the founder of South Korea's School for Broken Hearts.

In this conversation, we talk about how perfection resides only in your mind, how a celibate monk learn to give great relationship advice and how he manages his own relationship to ambition. We also have a fascinating exchange about enlightenment.

OK, so here we go now with Haymon Sunim. Well, nice to meet you. Thanks for doing this.

Oh, thanks for inviting me.

I should say good morning because it's 8:00 in the morning where you are and seven at night where I am. So thanks for getting up early with us. Yeah, no problem.

When did you become a monk?

I became a monk when I was in my mid 20s when I was very young. I was asking myself, you know, why was I born as a human being? Some philosopher, you know, describe this feeling that you are thrown into a movie theater without any kind of guidance and then you are waking up 10 minutes after the movie has started. And so you have to figure things out. Oh, OK, now we are 1970s. Oh, I am male and oh, I am from South Korea, you know what I mean?

All the things that you have to figure it out. So I was asking, what's the purpose and where am I? And that led to my interest in religion in general. So for a long time, you know, I was looking for my own teacher pursuing enlightenment, some kind of spiritual awakening. So that made me majored in religious studies and then eventually led me to become a monk.

That's a big move to become a monk, because you're basically saying, I'll never get married, I'll never have children. I'm going to dedicate my life to this practice.

Well, to me, it was life or death kind of questions. It wasn't as though I had options. I really, really had to find out the answers. Otherwise I felt like I was going to die or something. So these questions of why I even exist, well, who am I? You know, so I didn't have any other options.

Did you find the answer? Yeah, I think so, yeah, to a certain degree, yes, what is the answer?

You were born in this world to discover who you are. What you are, actually. Is that a knowable fact, what we are? It's interesting question because that which you want to become awaken to has the quality of unknowingness mystery. Because only then you can the subject and object division disappears in this realm of unknowingness. So can you walk into this silence in a space of silence where there's no more knowledge, there's no more objective quality about things? You cannot think of anything.

And yet you are wide awake, open, spacious and free.

That's what you are. So. Is it safe to say that our job is to. Know who we are. And yet we are fundamentally unknowable. Yeah, our job is, first of all, let go of all the label that we ourselves are wearing ID sometime we are identify with our bodies, our nationality, race, know all those pests, lifetime experience and things that in nature. But in Zen traditions, we are asking this question, what was you before you were born?

You know, what was the face of your true nature before you were born? And then also what you are ultimately asking, what you are ultimately trying to experience is the state of unconditionality. Can I say this? So everything that's condition you, that bind you, they limit you. It became one of the elements that makes you stuck. It also means that you are sowing the seeds for violence as you are identifying yourself with one element, as I am Korean or I am American, you know what I mean?

And as soon as you do that, it also means that you are dividing and that creates the seed of violence. That was then. And so. If you can let go of all of this ID that you have been accumulating ever since you were born, what is left? Because, you know, when we die, when we let go of our body. None of them will be important. All of them is impermanent, we cannot carry that with us.

And then what is left? What were you what was you before you were born? If I understand correctly, and I don't know much about this, in these riddles, these unanswerable questions like what was your face before you were born? What's the sound of one hand clapping? These they're called koans, and they're used to deliberately frustrate the logical conceptual mind so that in effect, you kind of break the conceptual mind and get beyond concepts. Am I at all in the realm of accuracy here?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, because our logical mind wants to seek some kind of answer and the answer has the objective quality, something that you can observe and state apart from you. You see what I mean? However, what we want to enter into is the realm of non duality in the subject, object separation disappears. In order to do that, you have to put your thinking mind in a monkey mind, rest yet to let the thinking mind make it quiet.

And then you see that, oh, there's a vast, empty quality of awareness, you know, so. Then you can say, oh, then where is the beginning and where is the ending of my awareness? And then you will see that, oh, there is no beginning and there's no ending. It is infinite. So. You can examine the quality of awareness little by little. For example, is my awareness located only within my body?

We often identify ourselves with our bodies, so anything that's inside my skin is mean. Anything outside of my skin is not me. So often we imagine our awareness is contained within our brain. Then the question is, if that is the case, then I should be only aware of what's inside of my body, not outside the fact that I can be aware of anything outside. It means that the quality of awareness, it's also outside as well. It is.

In a way, it's everywhere. Because you can be aware of that. So if you can just let go of your identification with your body, then quality of openness, quality of unknowingness, mystery, and yet you are aware of this vast emptiness piece, it opens up. That's why you are. I can hear I have this I don't know if you know this, but I have a magical ability to channel the questions of our many listeners. I'm being facetious, but I'm guessing now that some of our listeners are thinking, OK, this guy is talking about vast emptiness awareness piece.

But my daily meditation is like I feel my breath coming in and going out for maybe three nanoseconds and then I'm planning lunch and then I feel it again for a few nanoseconds. And then I'm thinking about whether I need a haircut. And then I'm, you know, cursing my political rivals and then I'm delivering glorious invectives to my boss, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. It has nothing it has no resemblance to the transcendence that you've just described.

That's what I do to you every day. So I have nothing special whatsoever. That's exactly what I do. However, you know, I am aware that there's space between my thoughts. We are not just thoughts, you know, as soon as the thought disappears. There's emptiness, there's a quiet moment, however, because we are Soul Train or so accustomed to focusing on an object, that is the thoughts we miss out that non dual moments where there is no more thought.

We as a human being, we cannot think. Twenty four hours straight, right. If we do that, then our brain will become so tired and you may die.

However, if you just examine yourself, there is a plenty of moments when this what I just talked about, the quietude piece, non conceptual moment it exists. You know what I'm thinking about as I listen to you talk about that, I mean, I really you're nodding my head because I agree with what you just said. And it's so useful to know that, like you, to struggle with the humiliating horror show of discursive mind. I was I was on a retreat a few years ago with my teacher, Joseph Goldstein, and I was on a retreat and I was complaining to him about how horrible my meditation practices and et cetera, et cetera.

And he started telling me about a Tibetan. And I know this is a different tradition than the one you're in, but a Tibetan. Expression that I'm probably going to mangle, but I think it is a Marjoe.

Which I think translates into how amazing and Joseph's argument was, when you wake up from distraction, maybe once in a while you lose a mojo to direct the mind to that exact moment that you were just describing, which is after the thought has evaporated and the thought could be incredibly embarrassing, you know, like you could be running through, you know, recently we're buying a house.

I've been running through like mortgage calculations or, you know, some ancient desire from 1972 or whatever. But whatever the thought is, it doesn't matter. As it evaporates, as it leaves, there's a little bit of space there. That's a home.

How amazing that the mind. Is if you're awake to it. Absolutely empty. It's empty, there's nobody home like you can see if you're just tuning the right way and maybe you'll talk about it, that there is this. I sometimes use the phrase this yawning chasm of pure knowing that's there. Yeah, that's always there, you know, it's not something that you have to fabricate, something that you have to manufacture, it's already there. That's the beauty of it.

This realm of unconditionality, realm of ng'andu reality. As soon as you can just detach yourself from your thoughts. And you can easily do that by becoming aware of your thoughts, like becoming mindful of your thoughts as soon as you become mindful of your thoughts. At that moment, you are stepping outside of your thoughts. Right. And there is an immediate release, immediate freedom from that. Thought so. Yeah, and then also the quality of amazing The Marjoe, you can look at beautiful nature right now.

If I walk outside, it's full of beautiful full foliage everywhere in Korea now and then when you are, you know, appreciating the beauty of trees, you might become so. You know, when you are appreciating something, you cannot think about things, your mind's become momentarily very quiet. And then you appreciate beauty and, wow, that is so amazing, you know, then right there, there's the experience of net neutrality. So when you appreciate any kind of beauty, it can be art, it can be music.

It can be human being. Your mind has to be very quiet to be able to appreciate. And maybe that's why we want to go to resume, that's why you want to go to a musical concert. Things like that, so that our minds can become temporarily quiet. Mm hmm.

Mm hmm. Yeah. We want to be blown away, quite literally. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

And that is like I think Nirvana is often described as a blowing out, like a blowing out of a candle. And that's a in some ways what we want. I think I'm stealing this notion from Dr. Mark Epstein is a friend of mine. So with a hat tip to mark, part of us wants whether we know it or not. Part of us wants to not exist because we want we want to yammering voice inside of our head to shut up.

And that's what draws us, as you said, to the great beauty of a museum or nature, any sort of that is on offer. Right in the beginning, we want to get rid of the emerging voice. You see that as a problem, that which blocking us from experiencing non dual state of freedom. Right. However, you realize that it is just the manifestations of your own awareness. So you begin to realize that it's not a problem, it is just like any other thing that you see, you know, you can look at your cell phone or you can you can plant, you can look at your lamp, anything it manifests.

And yet after a few minutes or a few seconds, it disappears. So it is beautiful, magical display of our mind, you know, and it happens without you doing it right. Like you are not there to. If you can control your thoughts, yammering thoughts, then it is yours, right. Because you can control it.

You know, in order for me to call my car is my car, I should be able to accelerate or I should be able to break any time I want. If I couldn't, then it's somebody else's car, somebody else is driving my car. But if you are looking at your mind this yammering thought, it just appears without you controlling it, you never intend to have that kind of thought immerge. Right, so it emerge without you doing anything and then it disappear without you doing anything.

It is magical display of your own awareness. And you are watching this movie of life, and then the question is, what is that which is watching it? That's Duquan. Yes, I mean, you can ask yourself the question, this, too, comes from Joseph to me through, I think, channeled through Zogu, which is a Tibetan style of practice and. You can ask yourself the question, then you're sitting and meditating, watching your thoughts or sounds or whatever.

Who's knowing what is knowing this, what is knowing all of this, and then you can ask then you can ask another question, which is who's asking that question? Absolutely, I mean, this is the ultimate question, you know, what is being aware that you can be mindful of your thoughts, you can be mindful of your bodily sensation, you can be mindful of any kind of feeling arises and disappears. And then there comes a moment when you realize there is no more object to become mindful of.

You will have maybe one minute or two minutes in your meditation and everything is so quiet. So serene, and yet there's no more new thought arises momentarily, it's quiet and there's no more bodily sensation that demands immediate attention. Then that which knows remains alone, right? It's still awake, still alive, that which knows then what happened is that which no become aware of itself. You mind become aware of your mind? You own is becoming aware of its own awareness.

That's the returning to your home, returning to your true nature. So earlier you described being a young person, feeling like these questions of who am I, what's my job on the planet? These big questions were like life and death, you said. And that drove you into becoming a Buddhist monk, so here you are in your late forties, if those issues are not what's driving you anymore, what is driving you?

What is driving me is my work. I started school for broken hearts. So what happened was, you know, I was into this kind of meditation and wanting to find out what happened even after I die, you know, all these big questions. Right? And then my teacher, my teacher, he has his own temple in Japan, New York. It's like thirty minutes outside of Manhattan. So I on the weekend, I went there and serve especially for Sunday morning service.

The congregation is largely Korean, American or a Korean immigrant community. And so. People will come and they have their own issue, they have their own problems, everyday life is very challenging. It can be a health issue. It can be relationship problems, all kinds. So even though I was very young, like twenty six, twenty seven people would come to me and ask this person in their 40s and 50s and 60s, you know, what am I supposed to do?

I have this problem. I have that problem. So I realized that the conversation while we you and I just had had very low or very small room with that person, you know, that person doesn't want to know anything about why they were born. They want to solve the problems with their child or relationship problems. They're about to go to hospital and have a huge operation. You know, how can I maintain sanity in this difficult situation? So I became engaged and this became my work.

And then I remember sometime in my thirties, one of my very revered teachers, yeah, in Korea and some members Buddhist, she went to him and asked very, very similar kind of questions. That is I'm having huge problems with in my marriage. You know, I don't get along with my husbands and problem like that. But he gave very philosophical kind of answer, you know, not down to earth, but more like everything is impermanent attachment is, you know, that kind of things in nature.

But he wasn't very helpful at all, you know? So I thought maybe, you know, the Buddhist monks, they have to do a different way of doing things. So I decided to open up sort of non-religious school where people who are going through difficulties in their lives, they can come and share their difficulties. So one of the first meetings I remember is a parent who are raising a child with disability. You know, I call and see if there's anybody who can come and wants to share and wonderful things happen, like mother could just discover her son has disability and her son is only eight months old.

And every day she wakes up and she is thinking about throwing herself with her baby out of her apartment. And so that my son doesn't have to go through all this difficult lives ahead of him, you know, and then she was able to talk to other parents, you know, other parents who went through all that process. And they could give her a lot of encouragement, a ways to deal with different situation, governmental resources and then support group and all of that.

And so she was able to, for the first time, find some hope. To me, it was incredible, you know, so I wanted to do more of that. So I started many different kind of group people who just recently got divorced or people who have terminal illness, people who are mentally having a very stressful, especially young people in their twenties and thirties. They've been looking for a job, and yet they couldn't find any job. And therefore their self-esteem is so low and they don't know what to do with this.

So I would just invite a different group of people who are going through difficulties in their lives and then we were able to do that. So every year we have about three thousand people coming in to our school and receiving benefits. So that became my work. This may sound like a bit of a tough question, but I actually mean it more from a point of curiosity than skepticism. But is it hard for you to answer? I mean, you're a celibate monk.

You're not in a romantic relationship. You don't have kids. You're not participating in the mainstream economy. So is it hard for you to give advice to people who are struggling with their spouses or their kids or worried about establishing a career?

Well, I'm a human being, so I don't think I am anything super different.

So the thing is, the I begin to see patterns like you are so attached to your own view in your marriage life. This is the certain way you have to do things and that can create some conflict and you cannot be open and become sympathetic to what the other person is going through. So I begin to see a pattern and I talk about the patterns and it worked. So on top of it, it's fine for me not to know the answer.

Because there are plenty of other people they can bring out their own experience, so I am there to bring people together and giving them opportunity to help each other.

Much more of my conversation with In Sunim right after this. Staying informed has never been more important, information is coming at us faster than ever. So how do you make sense of it all? Start here. Hey, I'm Brad Noki from ABC News. And every weekday we will break down the latest headlines in just 20 minutes. Straightforward reporting, dynamic interviews and analysis from experts you can trust. Always credible, always solid. Start here from ABC News 20 minutes every weekday on your smart speaker or your favourite podcast app.

So I know they call you a mega monk. How did you get to this point?

Oh, well, back in 2010, I was teaching small liberal arts college in Massachusetts. And at the time, people told me there is a new social media called Twitter. So I didn't know what it was. So I at first I just follow, like, the way President Obama, you know, he tweets what he did on that day, whom he met, you know, things like that in nature. So I. I did exactly the same.

You know, today I met my students. I went to my school cafeteria, and then I realized that this information is really, really boring, you know, and nobody will be interested in that. So I changed. And then I thought maybe from the my own meditations, I could see some of the pattern in my mind and some of the words that I wanted to say to myself, you know, some of the kind words, compassionate words.

So I tweet that, you know, and then people responded very positively. I was thinking about writing a book, you know, turning that into a book. And and my first book was The Things You Can See On You and You Slow Down. And that book became massively huge bestseller in Korea. And that book became the book of the decade or so. And then it was translated and then published in a number of different countries. But in the meanwhile, I was still engaged with tweeters and Facebook and things that in nature.

I'm curious, you know, we've done plenty of episodes here about the pitfalls of technology, of being addicted to your phone, being addicted to social media. How do you interact with this technology while endeavoring to build large followings and post on a regular basis without running into some of the obsession and compulsion and depression and famo and all the other stuff that can happen if we spend too much time with our noses in social media?

I think that's where meditation becomes very handy. That is, if you are overly obsessed or involved in social media, then you become aware, oh, this is very unhealthy. Maybe I should step away and maybe go out, exercise or walk around in nature or go to bed one hour early. So I would say that you become aware of your mental state as you are doing it. But the technology is, in my opinion, is a neutral in that it can be used for negative purpose, but it can be used for positive purpose.

Like, for example, you are at 10 percent happier meditation if people who are engaging in that act can receive enormous amount of benefits, all because of technology. So it depends how you use it in my mind. I just want everybody to know that I did not pay you to say that.

So another way that you've become so popular not only in Korea but around the world is writing books.

And one of the books that you've written that really is intriguing to me and that I wanted to spend some time talking about today is about perfectionism and some of the beauties of imperfection. Trying to look at the title here, Love for Imperfect Things is the name of that book. There's a quote. That you've said that inspired you from a 6th century Chinese Zen master, I believe in the quote is true freedom is being without anxiety about imperfection. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Yeah. You know, when you are completely awakened and become in touch with your own true nature, you see that everything that you thought you labeled as a problems, it is just a manifestation of your self nature and therefore you can relax. You don't have to be so obsess about let's call imperfections. I think that's where the term master is the master in China was talking about. But in every day, for every day in human beings just like me, I would say that there's a beauty in imperfections.

If you go out and look at trees, trees are never straight, never vertically straight, always crooked. There's always movement. You know, I think that creates a unique character. That's what makes it so special. For a long time, I thought to myself, I am a little bit like a child when I am going out and giving a talk. Some of my great masters, they would say in a very. Respectable way, very, very adult like way.

However, when I give a talk, I tend to become little more free and joyful. And so for a long time, I did not like that about me. I thought, that's not what people expect from a monk. Then I realized that the people who are following my tweeter's or social media precisely because I have that quality. So I think it has been the journey of embracing, accepting my own imperfections. And then when you can do that, then I think the real spiritual practice is right there.

This issue of perfectionism. It's a riddle for me, the so the Kawan, one of the koans, I don't know if it's appropriate to even call it that, but one of the riddles I've been mulling over since my first encounter with Buddhism is. Can you? Strive to be excellent.

While also not getting hung up on perfectionism and does the not getting hung up on perfectionism leads you to a resignation, like the idea of accepting your imperfections, loving your imperfections?

Does that is that like giving up in some way? You know, when we are thinking about imperfections, we tend to focus on ourselves. I am imperfect things that I do is imperfect. However, when you are thinking about other people, how I can help them, my motivation is trying to help them, then the focus isn't so much on me. It's about them whether they are receiving help. So if we think less about ourselves and more about people we are actually helping, then this question becomes irrelevant.

You know, as you are helping other people, there is the feeling of engagement and feeling of goodwill from our heart. So as long as we maintain that motivations, I think we'll be able to accept the situations. Yeah, I mean, we have to do our best given the circumstance. However, a lot of us, we are imposing too much expectations onto ourselves, and yet we feel like when we don't deliver it, we are a loser.

We have failure. But just check with your own motivation. What is your motivation? Are you there to help other people then even if the person who was receiving help didn't receive a huge amount and yet the other person may be say, oh, this has been a great help. Like, for example, you know, whenever I give a bad talk, I sometimes I give a bad public talk. And I was thinking to myself, this was a really terrible talk I just gave.

But after that, people would come up to me and they say, oh, how wonderful this talk was and how much beneficial this has become. So you never know. Well, I completely agree that being of service to other people can pull you out of your own self obsession, and yet, even though I try to. Put that wisdom to work in my own life, I still. And I don't think I'm alone on this get hung up on my own imperfections, you know, not liking the way my face looks in the mirror as I approach 50 or I didn't hit the numbers.

I wanted to hit on my latest exercise class or writing a book. In that last chapter I did, my editor told me it sucked or whatever. It's. Still very hard for me to not get hung up on these imperfections, and then I keep toggling back and forth in my mind between wanting to, as you say, sort of accept imperfection and on the other hand, wanting to do things that are great. And I get kind of confused in the middle there sometimes.

Well, you can look at it differently. That is. Oh, wow. I still have a room for improvement. You know, tomorrow when I go back and start exercising, I still have a room for improvement. And I can that get there quickly, as quickly as I want it. However, well, there tomorrow I can do it better. Right. So you can see that as a imperfections or you can see that as room for future improvement.

But is my motivation to improve because I want to get perfect, or is it, you know, so it does come back a little bit to some fiction that we may harbor of the possibility of perfection. Yeah, I think the result isn't so much whether the work is perfect or not, it's more has to do with the state of your mind. Is your mind peaceful, is your mind content with what is. So if you are artificially imposing certain kind of expectation, I need to hit this number, you see that how artificial this is the random that you chose this number and you are asking this to yourselves and this is the play.

That's precisely the reason why I say it's a magical play of our awareness. So enjoy this artificial entertaining quality of imposition that you made to yourself and see if you can improve tomorrow. Yeah, there's nothing wrong with this. I think we should strive to become good at what you are trying to deliver to other people. However, if you can also take not to seriously, you shouldn't take that goal too seriously and then approach this kind of childlike quality, then I think you can still find joy in it.

What's coming to mind for me right now, as I listen to you talk about this, is there's a I once read and will not be able to faithfully reproduce a great quote from Walt Whitman, the American poet of the Civil War era, and he talked about being both in and out of the game. T.S. Eliot talks about learning to care and not care, and I think those quotes speak to the paradox I'm hearing from you of like, can you do your best while also seeing that it's all, as you said, a magic show?

Yeah.

Yeah. So you are in the movie as the main actor, but you also become aware that this is a movie. So you will do your best to play that role in that movie, in the meanwhile, you've become perfectly aware this is just a movie. And that's where the elements of humor comes in. I think one of the reasons why great master like His Holiness Dalai Lama, he loves to laugh. You know, he has a lot of humor in it precisely because he knows this is also a movie.

I mean, not to reduce the seriousness of everyday human tragedy. That's not what I'm trying to say here. But what I'm trying to tell you is that ultimately speaking, when you see things as it is, if you don't absorb in the activity of your mind, if you can just step outside and look at it, then you will see that this is just a play, a movie that has very little or no control me control in it. And again, this is not some.

This insight about the magic show that you're describing is not something that you need to move to the Himalayas and wear nothing but loincloth for several millennia in order to perceive we can have the insight about the impersonal nature of awareness. Just in a five minute humiliating meditation session in our living room on the couch by noticing how little control we have over our thoughts. Right.

Right. So you cannot even say my thoughts. It is exactly thoughts, you know. Yes. Just like when you are sitting outside a coffee shop and looking at people walking by, you don't say my person. You know, all those people who are walking past. You don't call that as my something, right? It is just a person walking, passing by. That's what I mean by stop identifying yourself with thought. But again, what's so interesting that we're talking about here is the balance between being able to have these.

Insights, which, again, are pretty readily available and also transcendent in that they kind of get you out of the movie, it's a little bit like taking the red pill in that movie The Matrix.

You get to see The Matrix. On the one hand, you can have those insights. And on the other hand, you do still have to participate in conventional reality, you still have to do your best because your boss may be breathing down your neck about your sales numbers or whatever it is.

And so you need to be able to be in and out of the game in that way.

Right, right. Yeah, absolutely. That's you know, in my honored traditions, we talk about all this stuff away. You know, I pulled this off, I'm fully aware, enlightened being, who knows the true nature of reality as it is, and yet he or she is fully participating in everyday lives. That's precisely the same quality that you just talked about. It's absolutely, absolutely true. So do you ever find yourself and we talked about this a little bit, but with your success on social media, but now that you have had and continue to have so much success in conventional reality in the mainstream economy, as a monk, do you ever find yourself getting sucked into, I don't know, comparing yourself to other people or criticizing yourself or wanting more success and wanting to get on this show or that show or wanting a good review or wanting to know what your sales numbers are on your last book, et cetera, et cetera.

Do you find yourself getting sucked into that?

Yes, I do, yes. But when I do that, you know, I am also aware that I'm doing it. So naturally, we cannot help. However, you also know that you are doing it. So you are not taking things so seriously. And also check with your motivation, what is your motivations and why are you doing this? Are you doing this just to become famous, just to make a lot of money, or are you doing this in some way because you want to help other people in some way?

You want to connect with other people. I read an interesting thing that you said that relates to this discussion, which is I think you said that it's occasionally useful for you to reread your own books, to remember your own advice, to apply it in your actual life.

Yes, it's a silly. But, you know, I cannot live up to my own writing, you know, so there is a gap between what I'm saying and what I'm doing. And I'm fully aware of that. I think the love for imperfect things came out of that realization. The body stuff takes eons and eons of time to become Buddha, you know, precisely because he or she has to close that gap. That is between what you already know and what you are doing in every day.

So that's the real work between what you already know and whether you are actually carrying out what you are preaching. So to me, that's the real task. And then I just want to go back to what you just talked about earlier. That is this in and out of this two dimension. That is one is unconditional and non dual and another one is every day dual life subject and object. In the beginning, I thought that in order to get to non dual state, I have to try very hard.

And so as a result of my effort, as a result of my meditation, long and arduous meditation, somehow I'll be able to arrive at liberation, arrive at Satori or awakening. Right. Then I realized that if that was the case, then the fruit, the result of your meditation has to be also conditional. You know what I mean, because it is depending upon the cause, you know, hard work, many hours of meditations, and therefore, if gave birth to liberation, then that liberation, that awakening is also conditional.

However, what I was looking after was unconditional, something that's unbind, right, which means that it is something that is already here. Without you trying to make an effort to get there. Right, so the book, the things you can see, only when you slow down, you have to just slow down your mind, you know, and to a point that your mind become very quiet and pause, pause for a while and then you begin to see that.

The very thing that I was pursuing, I was in the midst of it. It's like a you are in Grand Central New York station and asking people, how can I get to New York? What do I need to do to arrive in New York City? That was the question that I was asking for a long time, but I don't know whether it makes sense, it I, I get it.

But it's also frustrating because. It's another paradox. We do have to work at our meditation. So that you can let go of your effort. Right, right, that's right. That's frustrating, because whenever I hear somebody say, well, if if, you know, awakening, nirvana, whatever, it's already here.

Yes. But I don't see it because I'm thinking about lunch. So I get frustrated with myself because I should be able to see this thing that's already here, this not thing, this know thing that is already here. And yet I can't because I'm so worried about, you know, like, you know, whatever. My latest score on peloton. Yeah, but the thing used their frustrations, frustration can be enormous health. Turn that into a spiritual energy.

I want to see the awakening, this reality of unconditional relm, the state of complete freedom, is supposed to be right in front of me, right. And yet I can see it. What's wrong with this? And this can become engine that can push you to let go, eventually let go of your effort, because for a long time, even though conceptually I it just like you, I was able to understand it is right in front of me.

I was suddenly in a very subtle way, still striving, still saying that, oh, this cannot be it. You know, it has to be something better. It has to be something more peaceful. It has to be something more fantastical, you know. So in my early 20s, I was looking for gurus and Zen master and Tibetan teacher who can give me that supernatural enlightenment experience, spectacular experience, know opening of Kundalini, opening of all kinds of supernatural show.

You can go to the and different realm and interacting with the different bodies of, you know, all of this I thought was enlightenment. But then I realized that all of this is impermanent. That's not what I was looking for. Again, I'm saying this is somebody who has not yet found what he's looking for, unlike, I imagine you, I'm guessing now. I can understand how. Big mountain top experiences. Unleashing. The flood gates of come to Lini or whatever it is, all of these experiences that you can read about, if you feel like reading spiritual journalism, how that would be to miss the point.

Yeah, because you want to get somewhere that's the beginning of your assumption, is that right now, is not it? You know, like I have to go and obtain whatever that I'm looking for. Right. And this very assumption is conditional. But to get to the point where we can let go and see what's right in front of us is going to take some frustration and effort and some suffering, it seems to me. Well, if that's what you're projecting.

Yes, precisely. That's what you're going to get. OK, let's us I just want to help you, you know, so so so let's just go back to what he said. So as soon as you become mindful of your thoughts. You know, whatever that bothers you, then, what happened to that thought and then the state of your mind? Loyal listeners will have heard me say what I'm about to say before, but I think it's worth anybody hearing this again, which is a huge shift in my meditation over the past couple of years, has been.

Noticing when I wake up from whatever distraction with some craven voice inside of my head, the anger, ambition, planning, whatever it is.

I have started to at first it felt very contrived, but over time it's actually feels pretty genuine to view these inner characters with some warmth. And for me, the combination of kind of just viewing whatever comes up as these ancient neurotic patterns that are trying to serve me perhaps on definitely on skillfully and to blow them a kiss and just go back to whatever it is is the object of my meditation, my breath, phrases of loving, kindness, meditation, or just an open awareness over and over and over again without much of an agenda, knowing that I'm not going to probably achieve Satori or Enlightenment or Kencho or whatever you want to call it on my schedule.

That's basically my practice now. OK, very good.

Then let's say you talked about this. You know, the feeling of warmth. Yes. Koruna and a feeling of this compassions, right? Yes. And then usually, you know, this compassion is directed towards something, you know, object. Right. But momentarily, can you just let go of that object, of your compassion and just focus on this quality of compassion, this warmth within your mind, right in this warmth? Do you have any kind of thoughts in it?

I'm asking you, I know I I'm going to give you an answer that's a little off subject, not off topic, but it's a little off exactly what you're talking about. But I think it's related and you can reach across the planet and slap my wrist if taking us down a rabbit hole, but. A really useful piece of meditation advice I got on a retreat I was on a few weeks ago. Is occasionally just to drop in a note into your mind that whatever you're seeing is just nature.

It's like a two step in some way or maybe for like boxing, this is too much of an aggressive metaphor, but a one two of a one two punch of one, some warmth and two, just seeing that there's nobody home anyway. This is all just nature. Right, as soon as you become aware that everything is just nature, then what is the very quality of your mind? For a nanosecond, yes, nanosecond, yes, spacious, yes, spaciousness, right?

Right, and you are not bound to. Any thoughts? Right. There's a release of your thoughts and wide open spaciousness, right? Yes, and and then you can you see if that spaciousness has any kind of limit, is there any wall that you bump into if you just keep going? Spaciousness. Is there any kind of limit? None. Correct, and then let's say it's just spaciousness, this unbound. Free spaciousness, that movement of your mind, can it just expand continuously?

In my mind, it can't because then I start thinking about lunch again or whatever it is, I have my next meeting or something like that. So but that's just the story I'm telling myself. Right.

But immediately, right up to your story. There is another nanosecond. That's right. Yes, yes, yes, yes. And then you realize that then the thoughts, the lunch thought is it came out of that nanosecond. Mm hmm. It's also nature. Absolutely.

So when you say as soon as say also nature, there's a release, there's a freedom. You know, you don't have to be so caught up. And this really is the space of wide open emptiness and enjoy, it's everywhere, you know, it's you're not bound, it's infinite, it's free and realize that it is also very quiet, peaceful. There's no subject versus objects. It's all just all in it. Unbound. Unbound. I like that because it doesn't have any kind of objective quality we often miss out because there's not is no fun to focus on empty space.

However, if you can pay attention, eventually you'll be able to see that that's the true nature because it's not it doesn't have an object. It also means that it's not going to disappear. Because it has not been emerged as an object. It's not going to disappear. I don't quite follow that like like this wide open, this empty spaciousness that we just talked about. Was there anything you can focus on? Was there any snow? Well, you keep using the subject object, you know, in a dualistic state in which most of us exist, there is a subject, me, the source of sort of infinite subjectivity.

And then there are objects. For me, when I notice. That everything that's happening in my mind is just nature, that there's not there's nobody home, I'm not directing the show, it's just then that duality collapses just for like a nanosecond. Yes. Yes.

So let's get familiar with that nanosecond in that nanosecond. Do you have any specific spot that you can focus on? Is there any kind of object?

No, no, right now there are objects that are arising within it a little bit later or immediately after that is as soon as the thought thought drops and then right before new thought emerges. Yeah, there is this nanoseconds of no thoughts in this moment of no thoughts. Is there any point that demands your attention? Is there any object that you can focus on? There is none. Because it's empty. And because there is no optic. It means there's no division between object and subject.

There is nowhere for your mind to latch onto. Nowhere for your minds to abide in, it's everywhere. Before I let you go, can I change this? I'm sorry, we've been on the mountaintop. We've been on the map. No, no, no.

There's no reason for you to apologize whatsoever. I brought us here, but we've been on the mountaintop for a second. We've been talking about. Big meditative stuff, let me just descend into the marketplace for a second and I hope that I can ask these questions in a way that will just connect in some way to the what we've just discussed.

But as you and I were discussing earlier, we you you find yourself in an interesting position for Monck, which is talking to people about sometimes about their love life, for example. And one question I wanted to get to you before we. Wrapped up here is. How do you define love? As you see things, what is love? I think one of the wonderful expression of love is paying attention, Ms. When you are in love with something, when you love your child, when you love your painting, when you love your whatever that your loving, then you pay attention.

And when you are paying attention to that, you don't think about yourself. Like when you are looking at your own baby son or a daughter sleeping at night, you open the door and then you watch your son sleeping quietly and there is a feeling of warmth and love and but at that moment, you are just only paying attention to your son. You are not thinking about your thoughts. It's just so when our minds become quiet and then can pay attention to whatever that is, then in that moment there is a quality of love.

If I can just pay attention to you without concerned about me and just really totally pay attention to you. There is the element quality of love. And the problem is when we think that we already know the other person, then we stop paying attention. We stop asking question. I know everything there is to know about that person and therefore I'm not curious about this person. And thereby we pay less and less attention to that person. And so I think love has a lot to do with our attention.

That does connect to what we were discussing about spaciousness and. The impersonality of awareness because. Under this view of love, when you're paying full attention to somebody else, you drop away. Absolutely.

And then there's a deep connections. Between that person and you and the connection that has always, always existed. But notice how different this conception of love is from the version we get from Hollywood or from love songs, pop music, where it's about, you know, fixating on the color of somebody's eyes or the way you made me feel or the way somebody dances. Yeah.

First kiss and all of that, you know, evoke a feeling of aliveness. A feeling of, wow, I feel like I'm alive, you know, but if you are looking at this feeling of aliveness, it actually comes. Is it related to your attentions? I don't think love has a lot to do with ownership. I own you and you own me. But in life, it's impossible to own anything. You can appreciate things, but you cannot own anything, so whether you can pause and pay attention and appreciate what's in front of you and you will discover love their.

Well, you've been very generous with your time, I really appreciate you taking all this time to chat. It's been fascinating and and I appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Big, thank you again, really appreciated that conversation was fascinating. Thank you as well to all the people who work so hard to make the show a reality. Samuel Johns is our senior producer. Marisa Schneiderman and Jay Kashmir are our producers. Jules Dodson is our associate producer. Our sound designer is Matt Boynton from Ultraviolet Audio. Maria Wartell is our production coordinator. We got a massive amount of extremely helpful input from our colleagues such as Jim Point, Nate Toby, Liz Levin and Ben Rubin.

And finally, as always, a big thank you to my ABC News guys, Ryan Kessler and Josh Cohen. We'll see you all on Wednesday for a fascinating episode with the drama teacher named Bonnie Deran, who's going to talk about the connection between the drama and indigenous wisdom.